Classifying Property Under California Law

Posted on Apr 2, 2016 1:19pm PDT

There are three basic types of property in California Law:
separate property, communityproperty, and quasi-community property. Determining the type of property will determine the rights and responsibilities
each spouse has regarding that property.

Separate property: Consists of any property and/or assets (such as stocks, bonds, retirement
accounts, etc.) acquired prior to marriage, or after marriage in the form
of individual gifts (even between spouses) or inheritances.

Community property: Consists of any property acquired by the spouses during their marriage.
It also includes the earnings of spouses during their marriage, any savings
accounts or deposits to accounts made during their marriage, and/or any
retirement accounts acquired during the marriage. Further, if funds acquired
during the marriage were used in furtherance of a separate account, the
“community”, or married couple can obtain an interest in that
separate property. (For example, one spouse has a retirement account from
his/her employment that began before marriage, once married, since his/her
earnings are now community property, any of those earnings applied to
that retirement account after marriage would now be applied with community
funds; thus, providing the married couple with a community property interest.)

Quasi-community property: Consists of property acquired by either one or both of the spouses when
living in another state that would be considered community property if
that property had been acquired while they were living in California.
If the property is determined to be quasi-community property, under California
law, the property will be treated the same as any other community property asset.

It is very important to determine the type of property to understand what
each spouse’s rights and responsibilities are during the marriage
and also to determine whether a spouse has an interest in that property
during divorce proceedings.

If the property is determined to be the
separate property of one spouse, than that spouse has sole rights and responsibilities during the marriage
to the other spouse, and he/she also retains all rights and responsibilities
to the property after the marriage ends.

If the property is determined to be
community property or
quasi-community property, then each spouse and/or both spouses have equal access to the property
during the marriage, and the property will be divided equally between
them after marriage. (Obviously, most property cannot be literally divided,
so objects can be sold and the proceeds from the sale be split evenly,
or spouses can each take other community property assets of similar value
to balance the equal division of property.)

The information on this website is for general information purposes only.
Nothing on this site should be taken as legal advice for any individual
case or situation. This information is not intended to create, and receipt
or viewing does not constitute, an attorney-client relationship.